


dirge

by hellchoirs



Series: for now they kill me with a living death [1]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Child Abuse, Gen, Human Experimentation, Hurt No Comfort, Murder, Pre-Canon, Temporary Character Death, Unethical Experimentation, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:28:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28020171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hellchoirs/pseuds/hellchoirs
Summary: There was pain, pain, pain; it tore into him and devoured him, and then there was nothing. There was black and white and grey and a frown- and Klaus woke up to the looming figure of his father."It seems your powers aren't completely useless, Number Four," he said. "You've come back from the dead."
Series: for now they kill me with a living death [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2052396
Comments: 2
Kudos: 25





	dirge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is another series inspired by multiple of my bad things happen bingo prompts. There will be five parts in all - _potentially_ six, depending on if I can fit a certain prompt into this series or not. It will be very dark, so please head the tags, and I'll put more specific warnings in the end notes of each chapter, and if you have any concerns feel free to comment them and I will try to respond as quickly as possible.
> 
> This fic is for the prompt: made into a lab rat.
> 
> As for my other fics, I do intend to return to them. I had to take a break from writing and the idea of this series has gotten me back into writing, so I will most likely be focusing on this at the moment. Thank you for being patient with me.

_ There was pain, pain, pain; it tore into him and devoured him, and then there was nothing. There was black and white and grey and a frown- and Klaus woke up to the looming figure of his father. _

_ “It seems your powers aren’t completely useless, Number Four,” he said. “You’ve come back from the dead.” _

* * *

It happened on a Thursday. Thursdays were one of the days he went training, after all. It made sense to happen on a Thursday; on a boring, ordinary, grey Thursday, when the rest of the world was dragging on with their own lives and he could almost melt into the anonymity of insignificance. Almost. 

Since Five had left, however, Klaus found himself under more scrutiny than ever. More scrutiny than he had had when he first started stealing the alcohol from Dad’s bar, than when he started plucking pills from Mom’s medicine cabinets, when he started rolling joints under the dinner table. Of course he was under more scrutiny, though. Everyone wanted to know where Five was. Everyone wanted to know if he was still alive. Whilst Klaus felt comfortable avoiding that answer, in the brief lapses of sobriety he had had recently, he had yet to see Five’s ghost. He was sure Five was fine anywhere, wherever or whenever he was. Five was smart. He adapted. He’d be fine wherever or whenever he went.

One answer wasn’t satisfactory for his family, however. They kept bugging him about it. As if Klaus wanted to be on alert for the moment of his brother’s death. No, Five could die and Klaus would prefer not to know, really. At least then he could pretend that he hadn’t. Five would make for a horrid ghost anyway. Get too into the idea of haunting; constantly nag and judge Klaus and whine about his predicament. Therefore, Five either had to stay alive, or he had to stay away, so Klaus didn’t have to deal with the knowledge that he was dead and his ghost.

But of course, even Reginald wanted to know; at least a little bit. At least at the beginning. Frustrated with his answers, or lack thereof, he upped Klaus’ training as well, probably just to spite him. The old man liked to do that. Spite him. 

So he upped Klaus’ training. More days, more nights, longer hours. Put more locks on the bar, in the hospital wing. Had Grace shake his bedroom out and get rid of his weed; got him horrifically, terrifyingly sober. Made the ghosts worse. 

It happened on a Thursday. It was grey, and the rain drizzled against the barred-up windows of the mausoleum and the wind whistled through the gaps and the cracks and curled around his exposed skin and nipped at his cheeks and his nose and his ankles. The damp chill of the floor beneath him had seeped through his clothes and right to the bone, the marrow, the marrow of his bone, making him shake and shudder and his teeth chatter; the chill had seeped through to his core a long time ago, now.

The sun had long since set as well. He hadn’t seen it, because of the way the mausoleum was built, but he had seen the sky get darker, had found it harder to see, as it got darker, and the ghosts became shadows that jumped at him and became corpses and shadows again, moving all around him, making it look as if he was spinning, spinning, spinning, and between that and the crying and the yelling, he almost threw up several times, there. 

He knew Reginald was out there. Or, he was sure of it, at least. Maybe he had left; maybe he couldn’t be bothered wasting his time here, listening to Klaus cower and sob and scream. Or maybe he was there, and liked listening to it; he wouldn’t put it past him. 

Not that it mattered much. He had plenty of ghosts to replace Reginald’s presence; too many ghosts; he couldn’t move without phasing through them; he couldn’t breathe; they were suffocating him, crowding him, cornering him, and, and, and-

And then-

There was pain. 

It was sudden, the pain. The pain was so sudden, and it didn’t start small, or slow, or build up gradually. There was nothing but noise and then there was just pain. Hands, causing the pain; nails like talons, tearing through his clothes, piercing through his skin, creating ravines in his flesh and muscle and rivers with his blood, and he really did throw up and choke this time, on the pain and the blood and the fear and the hands, the hands hurting him, the hands that belonged to the ghosts, not his, which glowed blue but looked nearly red instead.

There was pain, and then there was nothing, suddenly. Then there was a blur of black and whtie and grey; a frown, a crease in the brows, grass crunching beneath the wheels of a bike; and then there was the looming figure of his father, looming above him like a shadow, face a dark blur and silhouette bright with the artificial light from the Academy’s hospital wing.

Klaus’ throat was dry and his body hurt, it hurt terribly, and he didn’t know what just happened or where he was or where he should be or just had been or when it was, but he hurt and he was tired and something felt terribly wrong.

Squinting behind his monocle, Reginald eyed Klaus, before turning his attention to the gloves on his hands, the gloves like the ones on Mom’s, the ones with the blood on them, and his father said, “it seems your powers aren’t completely useless, Number Four. You’ve come back from the dead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter warnings: vague death and violence/blood.
> 
> Not specified: Klaus is 14 here.   
> Chapter count isn't specified due to editing and the final count might change, but if you'd like to know, it likely won't be that long - likely around 3 chapters or so, but it might change. 
> 
> Thank you for reading! If you like this, maybe let me know with a kudos or a comment; I greatly appreciate it all!


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